


Settle

by Ice20



Category: The Martian (2015), The Martian - All Media Types, The Martian - Andy Weir
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Car Accidents, Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Happy Ending, Hospitals, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Marriage Proposal, Surgery, sick!fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-12
Updated: 2016-02-12
Packaged: 2018-05-19 23:51:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5985280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ice20/pseuds/Ice20
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Beth and Chris are driving to Lewis' house for a lunch with the whole crew, when they are hit by a truck.</p>
<p>Chris only has some minor bruises and small cuts, while Beth is in critical condition.</p>
<p>- - - </p>
<p>No graphic descriptions, only a hurt/comfort fic. This is all really just an excuse for me to write some fluff and angst!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Settle

**Author's Note:**

> Post movie and book.
> 
> Set after the crew comes back to Earth.
> 
> AN #1: I'm not a native English speaker, and I've got no beta reader. Sorry for my mistakes, I do try my best.
> 
> AN #2: I don't know how it does work in the US, but where I come from, sometimes, med-schools ask their students to spend a brief period of time in different wards in hospitals, to see how things work in different places. I assumed it happens in the US, though it's really not relevant at all for this story – but, well, better safe than sorry, I guess, so I'll just leave it here and let you know.

Chris Beck had seen pain in his life. It was quite common in his line of work.

He could still remember the first day of apprenticeship in the orthopedic department during his last year of med school. He could still hear the sound of bones cracking loudly as they were set back into place, the agony on the faces of the patients he had to visit after a draining session of physiotherapy, the shock on the faces of those whose lives would never be the same again because of an asshole driving drunk and paralyzing them from the waist down.

And it wasn't only physical pain he knew, oh no. The third day of his apprenticeship in the ER, on his second year, he had had to tell a mother her only son was dead. He had arrived at the ER already deceased, Chris couldn't have done anything for the boy, but that didn't change anything - not for her, not for him. The wail of her sorrow had resonated loud in the already busy and noisy room. Chris had never known a human being was capable of emitting a sound like that. It had been what had prompted him to decide on specializing in research job, a couple of years later, and that, in the end, that brought him to NASA.

More recently, Watney's dead, and then his sudden reappearence, had made him see some more pain, this time shared by the men and women he was traveling through space with. The grief, at first; and the guilt and desperation, later on. These emotions, Chris was by now familiar with. He had had the misfortune of seeing and feeling them, many times before. But then Mark had been brought back on Hermes by no other than Chris himself, and he had met a new kind of pain. The kind that haunts your dreams, filling them with the images of one of your dearest friends looking underfed and malnourished, bruised and hollow, bloody eyes and hollow cheeks, smile uncertain when it had always come natural before. The kind of pain that keeps you wide awake at night.

But that, all that, could never prepare Chris for this.

A horn was hooting in the distance, and someone was shouting. Who was shouting? A woman, he thought, and she was calling for help speaking loudly on her phone, but he wasn't sure. She was distant, far away from him. Far away from Beth.

Beth was laying on the ground in the middle of the intersection, her left arm at a strange angle. She was bleeding profusely from her head. He had put her there, in the middle of the street, Chris thought. His mind was sluggish, slow as it had never been before, not once in his life.

He had moved Beth away from their car, after that truck hit them on the passenger's side door, right where Beth had been seating. She had hit her head hard, despite the belt she was wearing, and her cheeks and neck were bruised and swollen. The window on her side of the car had all but exploded. A gash on Beth's right cheek marred her pale skin, and Chris's brain told him that it would probably leave a scar. The broken glass had caused it. And the broken glass had cut her all along her skull, too. That's where most of the blood was coming from. And, God, there was so much blood...

Chris hadn't lost consciousness after the hit. At least, he didn't think so. He had just found himself sitting upside down in the car next to Beth, only he hadn't been wounded, while she had been on the verge of unconsciousness by then. Her eyes had been terrified, and she'd briefly tried to turn her head and look at him when he'd called her name, but the effort had been too much, and a groan of pain had escaped her lips. She'd definitely lost consciousness not long after that.

Then the smell of smoke had his his nose, and even though everything was foggy and numb, he'd _known_ he had to get out of there, he had to take Beth out of there. That's when he had finally found the strength to unfasten his seatbelt, and gett of his side of the car. He'd grabbed Beth, then, hands steady despite everything, and with all the due precautions and applying every single lesson he'd been taught back in med school, he'd pulled her out of that cage of steel and glass and sharp sheet metal the car had become.

He had paid particular attention to her spine and head, trying his best not to jostle her too much. He knew it was risky, moving an injured person like that, but so was leaving her laying there, in a car that was probably going to catch fire soon, too soon for the ambulance and firemen to get there. He had done his best not to hurt her any more than the accident already had. Chris just hope it was enough.

He heard the sound of sirens in the background. That woman really must have called the ambulance while he was getting them out of the wreckage, and then the police as he was resting Beth's body on the street. But they were still too far away, and Beth was still bleeding too much.

With practiced movements, he applied pressure on Beth's head with his jacked, now soaked in blood, and contemporary made sure not to jostle her right shoulder, that was probably dislocated. Right now that wasn't his immediate worry, though. The head injury, that could cause a lot of damage. That could be fatal, he thought, and then tried to push the thought away. He had to concentrate on life, on keeping Beth alive. Thinking of death would do no good to anyone.

A purple bruise was evident on Beth's collarbone, her black tank top showing it clearly. They were going to Lewis's place for a lunch all together, the whole crew reunited – apart from Vogel. They were both in casual clothes, and for the first time since they had left Mars and space behind them, Chris regretted the lack of an EVA suit and the protection it did provide, despite how awkward it made moving around. They would be late, he thought, baffled. His fingers were wet of Beth's blood.

He slowly turned Beth's head to look at the side of her skull. The wound was deep, he thought. She would need surgery, and a lot of stitches. They would have to shave her head for that. Beth would be pissed. It had taken her long months to have her hair reach a shoulder lenght that made her look even younger than she already was.

But the sirens were nearer, now. Chris could hear them a bit more clearly, even if everything was like wrapped in wadding, muffled and blurred. Everything but Beth and the crimson red pool of blood forming on the asphalt in the middle of the street.

“Sir, please move aside,” a woman told him, her hands immediately finding Beth's wrist and checking her pulse. Her voice sounded distant, but she was right beside him.

Chris looked at her. Hair pulled back in a tight bun, focused eyes and steady hands; if the uniform wasn't enough to give her away, than those signs told him she was a paramedic. Chris had noticed the sirens had gotten closer, but he hadn't understood how much 'till now. He slowly moved his body to the side, allowing her a better range of movement, but he still kept applying pressure on Beth's head wound.

“I'm a doctor,” he heard himself tell her as an explanation.

The woman turned and looked at him with a sorry but determined expression. If the slight widening of her eyes was anything to go by, Chris guessed she had recognized him. Then again, it could only have been because she had now taken a better look at him, and she could see the shock written all over his face, or the bruise he knew to be forming on his left cheek.

“I'm Kate, this is my colleague Adam. You've done a great job so far, but we can take it from here, sir,” she assured him, moving her hands from Beth's wrist and checking her head now, fingertips following the line of the cut on Beth's skull as her colleague dropped on his knees and put an oxygen mask over Beth's mouth and nose. Chris still didn't move away.

“I'm a doctor,” he repeated.

“I know, sir, but you were in the car with this woman, too. You may be injured. You may have hit your head, too, and a concussion could lead you to make a mistake and worsen the situation, instead of helping us. You've done a great job taking her out of that car, but now you need to let us do our job,” Kate explained, her voice professional even if her hands were gentle when they wrapped around his fingers and moved them away. Her eyes were kind, too, and Chris knew she had a point here. But Beth was all he could really focus on as he was moved to the side. “We promise we'll do our best to make sure she is okay, sir. The ambulance is already waiting, and the ER has been warned of our imminent arrival. Please, sir.”

The paramedic pulled Chris to the side as her colleague hooked an IV line in the back of Beth's hand. Chris saw him secure Beth's neck and head in place with the head immobilizer as Kate went back to the task of examining the wound, that was still bleeding. Blood, there is so much blood, Chris thought. His hand found Beth's limp one, and he held her slender fingers in his, rubbing soothing circles with his thumb on her wrist.

The paramedics put some gauzes on Beth's head and all around the wound, doing their best to contain the leaking and keeping the pressure steady. The blood loss seemed to have at least slowed down a bit. When they finally moved Beth on a nearby stretcher, making sure not to shift her any more than strictly needed, Chris followed the movement, getting on his knees and then on his feet, his joints cracking loudly and his equilibrium momentarily leaving him. Sharp pain ran though his neck and his vision blurred. For a second, he thought he would pass out, too. But no, no, Beth still needed him, this mess wasn't over yet.

Chris took a few tentative steps following the paramedics and stumbled only a bit. He didn't know for how long he had been crouched there beside Beth, doing his best not to let her bleed to death, but he was fairly sure at least half an hour had passed since he had pulled her out of their wrecked car.

Chris got on the ambulance with them as the paramedics hauled the stretcher up and secured it into place. When the woman yelled to the driver that they were ready to go, he braced himself for the sharp acceleration. Chris sat on the floor holding Beth's hand as the paramedics made sure her vitals remained steady.

“We'll reach the hospital in less than ten minutes, sir,” the woman – Kate, she had told him her name was – said.

Chris gave her a silent nod in response, too drained to do anything more than that.

“Sir, do you need medical attention. Are you hurt?” her man asked him.

Chris spared him the briefest glance, then looked down at himself, and understood why, despite he couldn't feel anything wrong, that wasn't a pointless question. His jeans were soaked in Beth's blood on the knees, where he had been crouched beside her. His once pale blue shirt was dirty and torn in a few different places, and his hands were shaking. He idly noticed that his fingers were covered in Beth's blood. Not only his fingers, no, but up to his wrist, his skin was covered in the sticky red liquid, now dried.

“No. I'm okay,” he murmured.

He didn't notice the look the paramedics shared at his answer.

“Are you sure, sir?”

“Yes. Take care of her, please.”

Chris didn't say anything else until they reached the hospital, and his hand never left Beth's one, his thumb pressed against his wrist, telling him she was really still alive.

A doctor all but ordered Chris to wait in a corridor as they rushed Beth through the doors of the ER. He was still stubbornly holding her hand, even though he knew he would never be allowed to go in there with her. He knew he had already been lucky they had not left him in the waiting room at all. Chris suspected it was because of his status as a colleague. Or because they were planning on checking on him, too, maybe later. He didn't really care.

Chris was left standing in one of the corridors that connected the ER waiting room with the operating rooms. He collapsed on the first chair in the line of similar gray plastic ones positioned all along the pale green wall as soon as the stretcher with Beth had disappeared behind yet another set of double doors, which probably led to the examination rooms and the operating rooms.

He sat there, and stared at the wall in front of him. Medics walked by with patients and folders under their arms from time to time, but Chris didn't keep track of them. All in all, it was a quiet place to sit, considering he was in the busiest area of the whole hospital. Subconsciously, he begun rubbing his hands together, trying to scrub the dried blood away. It was a half hearted attempt that didn't lead to any other result than Chris cutting the skin of his own fingertips, but he couldn't stand the sight of Beth's blood there.

A nurse brought him a plastic cup filled with water at some point. He wasn't really sure when, nor how long he had been waiting for news from the doctor that had taken Beth away from him. He took the cup and sipped some of the water. When the nurse, a man with broad shoulders, asked him if he needed medical attention, he shook his head. No, he didn't. He shied away from his touch when he tried to grab his arm, and told him he wouldn't move 'till he knew something.

His gaze was still lost, still staring at the wall in front of him and continuously checking the corner behind which they had taken Beth, when familiar voices on the other side of the double doors that separated the corridor from the waiting room in the ER caught his attention.

“Yes, sir... yes, Beth Johanssen. I received your call no more than fifteen minutes ago, your colleague told me she was in an accident and they brought her here,” Chris heard who he identified immediately as Lewis say.

“She's having surgery right now, ma'am. Are you family?”

“No, I'm not a relative, I'm on her list of emergency contacts, though. Some colleague of yours called me,” Lewis explained. “There should have been a man with her. Was he injured in the crash, too?”

Chris heard the male nurse give a negative answer. “Though we've not been able to visit him, yet,” he added. “He's in shock, but he seems to be mostly uninjured and refuses medical attention. He's in that corridor.”

“Oh, thank God! Hey, Chris is fine,” Lewis said, a bit louder this time. “Please, could you take us to him?” A brief pause. “Yes both of us. I know it's unusual, but it's like we all are family, really,” Another pause. “Thank you, sir. Thank you,” Lewis told the man, gratefully, as he gave her his assent.

Chris heard the double doors open, and the nurse moved from behind the counter to lead Lewis down the corridor, their footsteps loud. As he could hear him a bit more clearly now, Chris recognized him as the man who had offered him the cup of water earlier. With the nurse and Lewis', Chris heard the familiar steps of Watney. When you spend three years in a relatively small spaceship with five other people, you learn how to recognize everything about them – even the way they breathe, or how they walk.

The nurse pointed to where Chris was sitting on the chair. Slumped, more likely, with his hands in his lap and his eyes unfocused, but mostly fine. He checked the corner once again, just to make sure nobody was looking for him with any news. “There,” the man said.

“Jesus,” Chris heard Mark mutter.

“See if you can convince him to get examined. The paramedics and I tried to coax him to follow one of our doctors, but he didn't even listen to us,” the nurse told them before he headed back to his station.

Lewis and Watney exchanged brief, worried glances, then slowly walked down the corridor, their footsteps uneasy and unsure on the pristine floor. Vogel was currently in Germany for a series of conferences in his native country, and Chris guessed Lewis had told Martinez to stay with Marissa at Lewis' house, with their son and Robert. The ER was no place for a young kid and a pregnant woman in her first trimester, and Chris remembered Lewis had once confessed her husband was incredibly afraid of blood.

Cool hands covered his ones and Chris shivered. Lifting his gaze, he found Lewis kneeling in front of him, Mark on her side.

“Chris?” Lewis called him.

Her eyes were big and worried, and her voice betrayed her fear. It was rare to see such a stoic woman show so many emotions in a moment of crisis, when he had literally taken orders from her in life-threatening situations. He looked at her, then his eyes moved to the right, to the corner where Beth had been taken away from him.

Long fingers cupped his cheek and forced him to turn his head and face Lewis again.

“Chris.”

“Melissa,” he replied, voice low and small even to his own ears. “Mark.”

“Hey man.”

“Are you injured? The nurse told us you don't want to be checked by a doctor. You know better than this,” she gently scolded him.

“I'm fine.”

Melissa heaved a sigh while Mark suppressed a groan. “I think we need to discuss your idea of 'fine'.”

Chris glanced at his right. Still no one walking past that corner. “I need to know Beth is okay before anything else,” he mumbled.

Melissa's eyes softened and Mark smiled weakly.

“I'm sure she is going to be just fine. But we need to make sure you are, too.”

“I am.”

“Chris -”

“No, I really am.”

“You were in a car accident three hours ago, Chris!”

“The truck hit the car by Beth's side. I didn't – I – why didn't it come from my side of the car? Why did it have to hurt her instead of me?” he whispered, voice cracking at the end of the sentence.

Lewis pulled him into a hug – an unexpected but welcomed gesture – and Mark patted his shoulder comfortingly. They let him shake in Lewis' arms for a couple of minutes. He didn't cry, but it was sure as hell a damn near thing.

“Hey, none of that, okay?” Lewis whispered in his ear once he'd calmed down a bit and could focus on her voice again. She was still holding him tight. Chris let himself be held. She was warm, and soft, while he was cold and confused and frankly scared out of his mind. “I know Beth, she's way too strong to die. She went to space and back, through a mutiny and against NASA's orders; what's gonna a little car crash do to her?”

“It's only gonna be a matter of days before she's up and about again, ready to kick your ass at video games, I tell you this,” Mark added with a small laugh. “She'll be stronger than ever and bored outta her mind, but she'll be fine.”

Chris let out a small chuckle, pulling back from Lewis. “I let her win.”

Mark snorted ungraciously. “Sure, man. Whatever you say.”

Melissa smiled and Mark pretended to look at something very interesting and very invisible on the wall beside him as Chris wiped a few tears from his eyes.

“Thank you,” he told them, and they just nodded; he knew he mean, thank you for being here, for comforting me, for just being you. Lewis squeezed his hand a bit more – you're welcome, and of course, she was saying.

“Come on, handsome, let's at least go to the bathroom and clean you up a bit. You're a mess,” Mark said, helping him on his feet.

Chris head wasn't spinning anymore, not like it had when he had gotten up from his crouch on the asphalt to follow the stretcher to the ambulance, but he still refused to move. He looked to the right, still waiting for something – anything – to reassure him that Beth was really fine. He really didn't want to move until he knew something for certain.

“I'll wait here. Anything happens, and I'll come find you,” Lewis reassured him.

Chris nodded, and followed Mark down the corridor. The botanist was holding his elbow delicately, like Chris had witnessed him hold the new leaves of his beloved plants so many times. It struck him as odd: he'd never thought of himself as something delicate, and yet here he was now. They found the restroom after a few minutes, and Mark opened the door to let him inside. In front of him stood the mirror with a couple of sinks below it, and on the left there were the closed doors of the toilets, but Chris didn't even notice them.

He couldn't tear his gaze from the reflection of his own face in the mirror. Mark had said he was a mess; it was an understatement, if he'd ever heard one.

His skin was pale, and there really was a big bruise on his swollen left cheek. And then there was the blood. Not only it had soaked his trousers and his shirt and covered his arms up to his elbows, but it was on his face, too. A splatter had hit him square in the face, and little drops had dried on his forehead and cheeks. His eyes were a stark contrast against his pale complexion, and Chris understood why he had been asked so many times to let a doctor visit him. He would have wanted to visit a man who looked like he did now, had he been one of the doctors in the ER, too.

Sensing his shock, Mark tugged him forward by his elbow.

Chris stumbled to the sinks and put his hands underneath the faucet. Warm water his his skin and he took some liquid soap in his palms, before he begun scrubbing. Beth's blood slowly went down the drain, and Chris saw the long, angry red but he had done to himself in the vain attempt to clean his hands before, in the corridor, when he had been left alone.

Mark passed him some paper. “For your face,” he said, and Chris washed the blood from there, too.

When they emerged from the bathroom, he looked less like a survivor and more like a worried boyfriend, even if his face was still swollen and slightly pink from all the scrubbing with the soap and water.

“You look a lot better,” Melissa told him as he sat down on the chairs again, Mark at his side.

“Did they come out and tell you anything?” he replied.

She shook her head. “No, but a nurse said a doctor would soon come here and talk to you, we just have to be a bit more patient.”

Mark heaved a sigh, and Chris was immediately reminded that the man hated this place – after being all but kidnapped by a group of doctor for two months as soon as they got back, everyone would hate them, too.

“I'm sorry you have to be here. I'm sorry our lunch was ruined,” Chris told them.

“Not your fault, man.”

“Please, Chris. We'll have another one as soon as Beth is released, don't worry about it. We'll also have Alex and Helena join us,” Melissa said.

They sat in a companionable silence then, each of them lost in their thoughts. Chris couldn't stop thinking about the accident, about Beth's body being pinned against the car, about how much blood she had lost before the paramedics arrived. He hoped he'd done enough to save her. He hoped moving her hadn't been the wring call. He hoped his blurred mind hadn't lead him to make wrong choices. For a doctor who'd had a brilliant career and was rarely unsure of his decisions, Chris found himself contemplating and doubting his actions. The most important ones, the ones the life of his girlfriend depended on.

The three of them waited, and then an older man in pale blue scrubs and with a mask pushed on his forehead walked towards them. He looked tired but serene, and Chris was on his feet before the doctor had a chance to call his name.

“Beth Johanssen?”

“Yeah, I'm her boyfriend,” Chris said. “How is she?”

“I'm Dr. Salter, I performed the surgery.”

“Chris Beck. How is she?” he asked again. He knew he was probably coming off as rude right now, but he had to know.

“We had to perform surgery and suture the head wound, which worried us the most. Everything went smoothly and there were no complications. We gave her a transfusion because of the blood loss, and all her other wounds have been taken care of. Her right arm is in a sling, it was broken. She'll be bruised and sore for a little while, but we'll prescribe her with painkillers. She'll sleep through the rest of the evening and all the night with the medications she's on right now, which is good because her body needs to rest, and she'll need to stay here for at least a couple of weeks under observation, but she's going to recover completely,” the doctor told them.

Chris felt his knees go weak and he sat down on the chair again, boneless and heavy, and yet lighter than he'd been mere minutes before. “Thanks,” he sighed. “Thank you, doctor. Thank you so much for saving her life.”

The man smiled politely. “It's my job, sir. Also, I think you helped us by taking her out of the car yourself, and with all the due precautions too, as well as tending to her wound before the ambulance arrived.”

Chris's eyes widened in honest surprise. He didn't know the paramedics had told the doctor what he had done. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lewis and Mark smiling.

“I had to help her,” he just replied. He'd not acted as a hero, but as anyone else with his knowledge would have done – or at least, he hoped so. “Is there going to be any permanent damage?” he asked.

“As far as we can tell now, no, there isn't. But we won't know for sure until she wakes up and we do some tests, which won't happen until at least tomorrow morning.”

Chris nodded, then got on his feet and shook hands with the doctor, thanking him once again. When the man left, he felt on the verge of collapsing. All the anxiety, the worry, the fear and the pain came at him in a powerful wave hat his his senses, now fully awake. He passed his hands through his hair a couple of times, a nervous habit of his he''d never been able to suppress. Mark patted his forearm as Melissa grabbed his hand.

“Come on, doc. You're white as a sheet. We'll have you visited and then you're going to go home and rest. You look like dead on your feet,” she told him in her no-bullshit tone, her commanding officer voice.

“I do feel like it.”

Mark snorted. “I don't doubt it for a second,” he agreed. Then, “I'll accompany him to the nurses' station.”

“Good. I'll go ask where Beth's room is and text it to you both. I'll also text Martinez and let them know she's okay. See you in the morning.”

“Wait. You'll stay here? Tonight?” Chris asked her.

Lewis smiled at him, kindly. “Of course I will. I know you, Chris. You'll be back here in an hour even if Beth's gonna sleep for the next twelve one, in the event that she wakes up, because you don't want her to be alone. I would do the same for Robert, honestly.” She shushed him as he opened his mouth to protest. “I know you will, don't try and deny it. And I know it's not necessary, but I want to. I'll stay here, you do as Mark said and get checked out,” she all but ordered him. Then, she turned and walked down the corridor.

Chris stood there, wondering for a second what he had been expecting. He knew they were friends, the six of hem. More, they were family. They had shared an experience nobody else would ever fully relate to, and the bond that was born from it was a strong one. And still, he found himself surprised when his “space family” did something as simple as be there for him when he needed them the most. There was really nothing to be surprised at, he knew.

“Come on, Chris,” Mark tugged him towards the double doors and the nurses' station, where the male nurse who had let Mark and Melissa in took him away for a rapid but thorough check by one of the doctors.

When they said that, apart from a few bruises and small cuts, as well as a possible minor concussion, he was alright, and prescribed him a light painkiller to help for the pain, Chris heaved another sigh. Honestly, he was so tired he thought he would have fallen asleep, had they let him lie on the hospital bed a bit longer for the examination. Even though Melissa was right – he would be back here in less than an hour, if he didn't know there was someone trustworthy at Beth's side – he had to admit he was likely going to sleep like a stone for the next few hours.

Mark called a cab and gave the cabbie Chris and Beth's home address. “I'll stay with you, if that's okay. The doctor said the painkillers aren't strong, but you still need to be careful with your head for the next twelve hours of so, in case there's a concussion,” the botanist said in lieu of explanation when they both got off at Chris' house.

“Of course. I'll take the couch.”

“Ah, hell, no way! You were in a car crash just a few hours ago and I'm pretty sure there're more bruises and cuts under your shirt than you've even realized yet. You sleep in your bed, I'll be alright on the couch,” Mark assured him as Chris fetched the spare key from underneath a nearby rock in the small front garden.

Mark snorted. “Really? That the best hiding place you came up with? Really original, doc.”

“Don't be a smartass,” Chris muttered, but he was smiling, really smiling an amused smile, for the first time that day, so he really wasn't bothered by his friend's remarks at all.

Once inside, Chris went to the bedroom and pulled out a pillow and a blanket for Mark. Then he went to the bathroom and turned on the water, as hot as possible. Stripping out of his torn and bloody clothes, he piled them in a corner, too tired to put them in the basket like he would have done any other day – Beth was so happy she'd found a man with an obsession for cleaning and the willingness to do all the house chores she'd never learned to take care of.

Chris got into the shower and just stood there, letting the water soothe the tension in his back. Mark had been right about the bruises, there were a couple of them that were actually more painful than he'd realized, and they throbbed under the hot water. So he just stood there for a while, eyes closed, just breathing, thinking that everything was going to be okay, Beth would be fine, and anyway, she was alive and that was all that mattered to him.

After ten minutes, he washed up quickly and walked into the bedroom, fetching a pair of boxer briefs, old shorts and a faded t-shirt. He meant to go check on Mark and ask him if he needed something, but when he sat down on the bed to put on some socks, his body went limp. He curled up in fetal position and fell asleep almost immediately.

Chris awoke to the sound of someone moving in the kitchen, and for a moment he thought it was Beth, but she usually woke up way after him, and that alone was enough to remind him that Beth wasn't home right now. She was at the hospital. Checking his watch, he saw it was already 7.30am. Rolling out of bed, he hurriedly put on a pair of clean blue jeans, a shirt and a sweater. In the bathroom, he combed his hair and bushed his teeth, then went into the kitchen, where he was greeted by Mark standing in his boxers.

“Didn't have any pjs with me and I didn't want to wake you up,” the botanist explained.

Chris shrugged. It wasn't the first time he had seen Mark wearing only his underwear.

“I need to go to the hospital, see how Beth's doing.”

“Shouldn't you eat something first? We skipped lunch and dinner, yesterday,” he was reminded.

And, yes, now that he thought about it, he was hungry, but he had to go. “Mark -”

“No, Chris, come on. Lewis is there, she promised she would call us if anything important happens. She texted me half an hour ago, saying that the night was completely uneventful and Beth woke up briefly so they did their tests. Now she'd sleeping again. We have time for a coffee and cereals,” he said.

Mark was right, Chris knew it. He'd already swallowed a painkiller without any food in his stomach the previous evening, so eating was really unavoidable now. Reluctantly, he sat down and had some cereals with his milk and a cup of coffee, while Mark ate some fresh fruit.

“I hope you slept well,” he said to make some conversation. He was actually feeling guilty for falling asleep like that, and Mark had had to sleep in his boxers because he hadn't even thought about pjs.

“Dude, your couch's almost better than my own bed. How many times a week does Beth make you sleep there? That's the reason you chose it so comfy, isn't it?”

Chris laughed. “Never slept on the sofa before. Unlike someone else, I know how to treat a lady.”

“Dude, that was one time!” Mark groaned. “Why did I tell you that?”

“'Cause you couldn't keep your mouth shut on a desert planet, what chance could I stand once you came back to actually living with other humans who wanted to listen to you?” he laughed.

They finished their food, then Chris called two cabs, one for himself, and another for Mark.

“You sure you don't want me to come with you?”

“No, it's okay. Just go home and get some rest – real rest, not the crappy one you got on my couch despite what you keep saying.”

When the two cabs arrived, Chris briefly hugged Mark. He wasn't really one of those people who hug constantly nor easily. He'd grown up with distant parents and an older sister, hugs really weren't his things. But sometimes, just sometimes and with the right people, he felt like it. So Chris hugged Mark, and thanked him again, hoping the botanist could understand how much he meant it, and then he got in the cab.

When he got to the hospital floor where Beth's room was, he met Dr. Salter again. He greeted him and they shook hands.

“Any news?” Chris asked.

“Yes, actually. We ran all the due tests, and from the results we can see, she's completely fine. No brain damage, nothing to worry about. We'll repeat the tests in the next few days to make sure everything stays fine, but frankly I'm optimistic.”

Chris nodded. “Thank you, doctor. I was a bit of an asshole yesterday, I understand it, and I'm sorry.”

The man laughed. “Don't worry, Dr. Beck, it was completely understandable. And trust me, I've met assholes, and you were way nicer than any of them,” he said. It didn't escape Chris' attention that he'd been called by his title, which meant the man had recognized him. For once, he didn't mind. “Also, I wanted to tell you that I really meant what I said yesterday, what you did helped miss Johanssen a lot.”

Chris smiled. “I was so worried I had fucked up.”

“You didn't. Well, I have to keep checking on him patients, but it was a pleasure to meet you again.”

“Likewise. And thanks, again,” Chris said as goodbye.

Walking down the corridor and around a corner, he saw Melissa sitting in the small waiting room with a cup of coffee from a nearby machine.

“Hey.”

“Hi.”

“You look a lot better. Did you catch some hours of sleep?”

“I did. Thank you. What about you?”

“The chairs here aren't really made to be slept in, but I caught some hours of rest anyway, and once I get home I'll sleep some more.” She sipped a bit of coffee. “The doctor was here not long ago, he says everything is okay.”

“I know, I met him when I got off the elevator.”

“Beth was awake, earlier. Not coherent, but awake. She greeted me with an overjoyed, _hello Commander!_ She actually shouted my rank so laud she startled the nurses,” she admitted with a smile. “They did all the needed tests, and then she fell asleep once again, so I sat here because I didn't want to disturb her. They told me she should wake up soon again, anyhow,” she told him.

They sat together silently for a little while.

“Melissa, I wish to thank you. For, you know, coming to the ER, waiting with me, and then staying here.”

“Chris, please, we already talked about this, no need to say thank you. And you'd have done the same for me and Robert.”

“Of course I would have.”

“Then it's okay, uh? Everything is going to be just fine. But you can always buy me a drink, if you want,” she said with mirth in her eyes. She got up and grabbed the light jacket she'd neatly folded on a nearby chair, pulling it on, ready to go. “You'll be fine, waiting here alone for a bit?”

“Yes, I will,” he assured her, getting on his feet, too. Another old habit of his. He couldn't help but _always be the perfect gentleman_ , like Beth usually said. Not that she minded it. “Thanks Melissa.”

“You're welcome, Chris. Tell Beth I said hi and I'll come by with some of that chocolate she likes to much tomorrow.”

“I will. Drive safely,” he told her as she walked to the elevators. With a final wave, the doors closed, and Chris was alone.

He walked to Beth's room, and slowly pushed the door open. Inside, the room was dimly lit and Beth was sleeping quietly in her bed, face pacific and serene. From the foot of the bed, Chris took her chart and read through the notes taken by his colleagues. Satisfied by what he'd seen, he grabbed the only small chair in the room and put it beside the bed, so that he could take Beth's hand in his own. Her hand was so small in his one.

As she slept, he looked at her. She'd always been small, but she'd never made Chris think of her as delicate nor fragile, and yet, seeing here now, in a hospital bed, made him feel uneasy. There were dark bruises on her arms and the right one was in a sling. New bruises were blossoming on the right side of her face, as he'd expected. And he'd known they'd have to shave off her hair to tend the head would, yet seeing her with shoulder length hair on only half of her head seemed strange. But she looked peaceful, sleeping serenely, and that made him happy.

Maybe sensing his gaze, Beth begun to wake up. Chris gave her the time to take in her surroundings, and as her big brown eyes landed on him, she smiled.

“Hey, gorgeous,” she whispered.

“Hey you,” he smiled back. Bending over the bed, mindful of the bandages and bruises, Chris brushed his lips against hers, always so soft. “How are you feeling?”

“I think they're pumping me full of the good stuff, 'cause honestly I can't feel anything at all right now.”

“Good.” Chris chuckled. “I talked to your doctor, and he'll come by and talk to you later, but he says you're going to be fine.”

Beth exhaled a long sigh. “Thank God.”

“Do you remember what happened?”

She nodded. “Yes, all of it. Up until I passed out, that is.”

He nodded, kissing the back of her hand tenderly. That was good; memory loss could indicate the trauma had been more extensive than expected, but it wasn't the case, appearently.

“I think Lewis was here? Before, I mean.”

“She was. She says she's gonna come by tomorrow, she'll bring that chocolate you like so much.”

Beth smiled delighted. “I love that chocolate.”

“I know you do. When you get out of here, I'll buy you enough to fill in the guest bedroom,” he promised.

Beth laughed, then winced at the pain in her side, then laughed again, and just like that, Chris knew everything would be okay.

Ten days later, after being released from the hospital and coming home with an armful of small gifts and get-well-soon cards and flowers from all of their friends and colleagues, Beth gasped in surprise actually finding their bed covered in boxes of that expensive chocolate she liked so much.

“The whole guest room was a bit too much to fill, I would have bankrupted if I tried,” Chris joked. “You'll have to settle for our bed only.”

Beth slowly walked to the bed, mindful of her various bruises and still tender muscles, and saw the small box open with a simple but extremely nice ring in it. She turned to look at Chris, eyebrows high on her forehead in surprise, and he just smiled.

“For you. If you, uh, want.”

Beth smiled the most gorgeous smile he'd ever seen, despite the swelling and cuts.

“I'll be happy to settle for it. For you.”

**Author's Note:**

> I really hope you enjoyed this! Let me know what you think.  
> Kudos and reviews always make me happy.  
> If you want to chat, you can find me on Tumblr: [IceDrifter](http://www.icedrifter.tumblr.com)


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